The rising adoption of cloud platforms and tools worldwide has significantly bolstered the career prospects of cloud professionals. Mike Loukides, VP of emerging tech content strategy at O’Reilly Media, discusses existing employment and salary trends in the cloud sector and the looming disruptions professionals should keep in mind.Â
According to a recent O’Reilly surveyOpens a new window , IT employees earn more money while working remotely or in hybrid environments and may enhance their salaries and develop new skills at work. The survey also found that cloud specialists make, on average, $182,000 per year. Nearly two-thirds of respondents (63%) work entirely from home full-time, and 31% have a hybrid schedule where they visit the office one to four days weekly. Additionally, the survey revealed that hybrid employment was linked to higher total income. The average compensation for hybrid employees was $188,000, whereas that of full-time remote employees was somewhat lower ($184,000).
“Cloud professionals are currently the most sought-after tech talent and therefore have the ability to choose from an array of employment options that best fit their lifestyle. During the pandemic, we witnessed millions of workers resign from companies in an effort to reconfigure their careers and take deliberate steps toward new job opportunities with higher wages and better alignment between their work and life goals,†said Laura Baldwin, the president of O’Reilly.Â
“With these workers in such demand, we anticipate the great tech exodus to continue unless employers step up with competitive pay, substantial benefits, remote work flexibility, and on-the-job learning and development.â€Â
In a conversation with Spiceworks, Mike Loukides, VP of emerging tech content strategy at O’Reilly Media and author of the 2022 Cloud Salary Survey, discusses the key employment and salary trends in the cloud sector.Â
See More: 10 Cloud Security Trends That Will Shape 2022 and Beyond
Cloud Industry Employment & Salary Trends for 2022
The cloud job market
Organizations of all sizes are utilizing cloud tools and services and, in turn, need experienced staff with the appropriate skill sets. The O’Reilly Media survey found that the largest salaries and pay increases went to those certified for one of the big three cloud platforms: Google Cloud, AWS, and Microsoft Azure. The current job market is just as hot as the housing market. The demand for skilled cloud professionals has exceeded the supply. It’s safe to say that if you are proficient in this area, your job opportunities are endless.Â
When you look at the number of respondents who left their employer, are planning to leave their employer, or got a promotion and a salary increase, it’s easy to see why salary budgets are under pressure. Right now, qualified candidates have the power in the job market. However, the stock market correction that began in March 2022 and significant layoffs from some large technology-sector companies may be changing.Â
Salaries by gender
In terms of whether women are being paid fairly, the gap is larger in the data and AI salary survey that O’Reilly Media published in 2021 (16%). Even in the cloud sector, the average salary for women is 7% lower than for men. That could be because of the different industry sectors. But it could also be because of the extreme upward pressure on salaries last year and this year. “When companies are desperate to hire, they are willing to pay what it takes. It will be interesting to see what happens now that we are moving into an economy where workers fear a recession. If the gap continues to narrow, we will know that we are really making progress.Â
“The difference between the salaries of men and women is smaller than we expected, given the results of last year’s Data/AI Salary Survey. But it’s still a real difference, and it begs the question: Is compensation improving for women?†says Loukides.
Bridging the gender gap
Loukides says that cloud companies need to look at industry surveys, data published by governments (which usually has income broken down by gender), and their data. There’s no excuse for not carefully monitoring the salaries paid to women and men within your company. If you don’t measure it, you can’t change it, which is easy to measure. A look at the salaries of job offers that weren’t accepted might also reveal a lot.Â
He adds that when you have companies working together, you are most likely to end up with cartels that decide how much men and women are worth. “I don’t think the results would be good. I think there’s probably a role for organizations like ACM and IEEE to collect and publish salary data and to work with HR groups to help them achieve equity.â€
See More: Joint Cloud Computing: How Can Organizations Benefit From This New Trend?Â
Job security and future
Job security was an issue for 4% of the respondents, a very small minority. That’s consistent with O’Reilly’s observation that employees have the upper hand in the labor market and are more concerned with advancement than protecting their status quo.Â
“At this point, the Great Resignation is over. Employees are worried about a recession and keeping their jobs. I think a lot of that is perception rather than reality; companies still have trouble hiring. But I would be very surprised if the number of employees concerned about job security wouldn’t be higher if we did the survey today, and I expect it to be higher next time we run a survey,†Loukides says.Â
Addressing the skills shortage
“All of our surveys have shown that an investment in training and certification pays off. The biggest payback comes from training programs focused on the big three cloud vendors: AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud.Â
“In specific skills: people will need to understand distributed computing, which is a heavy lift. They’ll also need to understand containers and container orchestration. Cloud security isn’t fundamentally different from any other kind of security,†Loukides says. “Still, most organizations are doing a poor job of building secure systems, and I have read reports showing that most cloud security problems arise from misconfigured identity and access management. So that’s a good start. Invest in training programs. It will pay off.â€
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